Help wanted as applicants are scarce

AURORA» In a country in the midst of sustained economic growth, Colorado has been ahead of the pack. Month after month of an expanding economy has resulted in some pretty good times for business owners across the Centennial State.

The state’s economy recently was ranked as the best in the nation by U.S. News and World Report, in large part to an expanding economic sector that has seen its gross domestic product grow at a 1.8 percent clip from 2006 to 2016, above the national average of 1.2 percent during that period.

But even the sunniest news isn’t without its share of clouds.

That expanding economy means businesses are looking for more and more employees to meet demand. With the state’s unemployment rate at 3 percent, more than a point lower than the national average and 10th lowest overall, employers are faced with a dilemma: How do they staff to keep up with expansion when there’s no one to take the job?

A nearly nonexistent unemployment rate might seem like the ultimate goal for an economy. But a vast majority of economists believe it’s important for an economy to have a pool of unemployed workers. When economies have rock-bottom unemployment, it restrains the ability of businesses to expand, which in turn puts the brakes on economic growth.

Three sectors in particular are feeling the crunch of low employment numbers: construction, food and beverage, and health care.

The building industry has expanded its employee rolls by 6.7 percent in the past year, one of the fastest-growing sectors in the state, with demand sky high for skilled labor. The restaurant business makes up 12 percent of the state’s labor force, and sales have expanded since 2010 by 38 percent. And the health care sector is facing a major cliff as its workforce gets older and older.

Construction

It’s not hard to spot a construction site in the Denver region, but there are hardly enough construction workers to fill all those sites.

“Labor is not keeping up with the change in the demand, unfortunately,” said Michael Smith, who runs the Colorado Homebuilding Academy. “We’ve got a labor shortage.”

By 2025, Colorado is expected to see approximately 100,000 open positions in construction and special trades, according to researchers at Colorado State University. A lot of those existing or soon-to-be-open positions are the result of an aging workforce and exploding industry.

“From the Gaylord hotel to the I-70 (road construction), we end up stealing (workers) from each other — and we need to stop that and start building a larger pipeline of people coming into the industry,” he said.

On most afternoons, the Colorado Homebuilding Academy’s workshop in a north Denver industrial park is filled with a few dozen high school age students who want to go into the industry.

A construction worker shortage isn’t just a local problem. A top concern for builders in 2016 and 2017 was labor. A survey from the National Association of Homebuilders shows the issue has steadily been increasing, too. In 2011, 13 percent of builders rated labor issues an important concern. That increased to 30 percent in 2012, 53 percent in 2013 and eventually 71 percent in 2015.

Kitchen magicians?

It doesn’t matter if it’s a fast food franchise, a casual eatery or the finest of fine dining. Restaurants in Colorado, especially in the metro area, are having a hard time staffing kitchens.

A cursory search of job boards for companies such as Illegal Pete’s or Red Robin shows a massive list of open kitchen positions that need to be staffed. And that demand is being felt from the largest chain restaurant to the smallest corner diner.

Many of the challenges facing the food and beverage industry in the state are the result of too much of a good thing. Colorado’s restaurant market has been one of the fastest-growing in the nation, with sales topping $12 billion in 2017.

“Last year we had 245 restaurant openings just in the metro area. And that doesn’t include quick-service restaurants. It doesn’t include a lot of chain restaurants. That number is primarily the independent ones,” said Carolyn Livingston, spokeswoman for the Colorado Restaurant Association. “All indications show we’re growing. Maybe not at the pace we were growing a year or so go, but we’re still very much on an upward trajectory.”

The large growth of the industry coupled with an expanding customer base from the state’s growing population are driving the demand for new dining options. But just because there’s demand doesn’t mean the industry can meet it.

For example, real estate developers are reaching out to chefs and restaurant groups and offering them a space for a new location in their projects, Livingston said. But finding a space for a new restaurant isn’t the big challenge. It’s finding the staffers.

A nurse in the house?

With more than 7,000 employees, University of Colorado Hospital on the Anschutz Medical Campus is among Aurora’s biggest employers.

But even with thousands of nurses, doctors, administrative workers and others coming and going from the booming hospital each day, they’d like to add people. Doing that, though, is proving especially challenging.

“I think this is the toughest hiring climate we have had,” said Ben Wankel, vice president of human resources at the hospital and a 13year-veteran of the hospital.

Wankel said today the hospital has about 500 open positions.

The toughest spots to fill are nurses to work in the operating room. Across the country, hospitals say they are coping with a significant nursing shortage, and UCH is no different.

To land those expert nurses, Wankel said the hospital has offered $10,000 bonuses, but they are still looking for more.

“Our competitors were quick to match it,” he said.